1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a recording apparatus such as an ink jet printer, which discharges liquid such as ink onto a recording material, thereby carrying out desired recording.
2. Related Art
In the past, ink jet printers which discharge liquid (ink) from a recording head onto a recording material such as single sheet paper or rolled paper, thereby carrying out desired recording, have been developed in large numbers. Among such ink jet printers, there is an ink jet printer which can carry out recording with a mesh cloth having openings, such as fabric or mesh tarpaulin, as a recording material, as shown in JP-A-2009-279780.
Then, in the ink jet printer aimed at the mesh cloth or the like, since waste liquid (waste ink) which has not been used in execution of recording, of liquid discharged from the recording head, is generated in large amounts, a waste liquid recovery device which recovers the waste liquid is provided.
In JP-A-2009-279780, a waste liquid recovery device provided with a waste ink tray disposed in a facing area with respect to a recording head with a gradual slope is disclosed. This waste liquid recovery device has a structure that requires maintenance work in which a user transfers waste liquid accumulated in the waste ink tray to a recovery tank or the like at an appropriate timing.
However, if the size of the ink jet printer is increased, the amount of waste liquid which is generated becomes a great amount, so that the size of the waste ink tray is also increased. Therefore, there is a problem in that a burden to a user who performs the maintenance work increases.
Further, in a serial type ink jet printer which carries out recording by reciprocating a recording head in a width direction crossing a transport direction of a recording material, after the recording head is moved to a flushing position provided at a separate distant position outside a recording execution area, a flushing operation is performed. For this reason, the flushing operation becomes a factor interfering with shortening of a recording execution time (improvement in throughput). In addition, flushing refers to blowing away ink from nozzle openings of the recording head to refresh the nozzle openings.